A South Australian Perspective

My partner and I moved to NSW from Adelaide in 2000. It was with
disbelief several years later that I discovered that children in this
state are faced with this farcical situation in public schools. I
attended school throughout the 70s and 80s in South Australia where
there is no religious education in public schools. In South Australia
religious education has, as long as I can remember, been the domain of
private schools or Sunday school. This is also the case in Victoria.
There is ample opportunity for parents to introduce their children to
religion outside school hours and I was absolutely gobsmacked that NSW
public schools still have in place this archaic system. My son is about
to start school next year and I truly hope that this situation can be
altered very soon to allow my children access to a suitable alternative
to scripture classes. Ideally I would prefer that there be no scripture
classes at all in schools, but the ethics course would be an acceptable
alternative. I also believe that a subject looking at all world
religions as well as ethics from an un-biased point of view would be a
valuable addition to the public school curriculum. I must add that I am
not anti-religion. I had a Christian upbringing myself, but I strongly
believe that it should not be part of the secular school system and I am
amazed that this hasn’t been questioned and remedied in the past in this
state. The very idea that outside religious groups have unfettered
access to the developing minds of our children is simply beyond belief.

Jess